


Brother of the Year

by Eiliem



Series: Tiny!Ace and Tinier!Luffy [8]
Category: One Piece
Genre: Brotherhood, Childhood, Cuddling, D Brothers, Ficlet, Fluff, Gen, POV Third Person, Pre-Canon
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2009-11-25
Updated: 2009-11-25
Packaged: 2017-10-03 17:58:46
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 886
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20792
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Eiliem/pseuds/Eiliem
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>No one ever taught Ace how to deal with scared, sniffling little brothers. So he makes it up</p>
            </blockquote>





	Brother of the Year

The first time Luffy comes crying to him, Ace doesn't know what to do.

Luffy. _Crying_. And, well, he's not bawling but – Ace has seen him fall down stairs and get his hand stuck in door jams and accidentally wade into briar patches (and nearly drown, oh god) without so much as a whimper.

And now he's sniffling and looking...spooked. Spooked is a strange and unnatural look on Luffy.

So Ace pats him on the back a little and murmurs something reassuring – and Luffy is _too spooked_ to even tell him what's wrong – and gives him a tissue to wipe his nose. He waits until Luffy calms down a bit, sticky hands unclenching a bit from Ace's shirt, breathing evening out, and leaves him with the beetle he'd caught and carefully hidden away for instances in which Luffy-bribing was required.

Then he goes straight to Dadan and Gramps and _freaks out_.

"He's crying and I don't know what's wrong and he's scared and Luffy _is never scared of anything!_"

Dadan waits until Ace stops hyperventilating and goes and checks up on Luffy, whose beetle-induced glee can now be heard resonating throughout the house. Gramps, half-way out the door to catch the ship that will take him to whatever it is Gramps does when he isn't visiting them, gives him that Look he always does when Ace does something different or unexpected in training. Then he grins at Ace and thumps him affectionately on the head - _take care of your brother_ \- and leaves.

Ace doesn't know what Dadan says to Luffy, or if Luffy says anything, but his little brother is back to his normal, fearless, stupid – Luffy _those are not for eating!_ – self and Ace doesn't know what to think, but maybe it's just more Luffy weirdness.

 

The next time Luffy comes crying to him, he's at least a little prepared.

He decides to try a hug this time. Hugs are comforting, right? Even if the way Luffy _clings_ to him makes Ace think the world is ending.

It works, at least – his little brother calms down much faster this time, starts laughing at the new beetle Ace was raising in his drawer all the sooner.

He doesn't run to Dadan this time. Luffy had come to _Ace_, after all, and he thinks there's probably nothing their guardian – or grandfather, here for another visit – could do for Luffy that Ace can't. So he stays and watches Luffy play with the beetle and then helps him wash up when the beetle sprays nasty stuff all over Luffy's hands before flying off. Oops.

 

The third time Luffy comes crying to him, late one afternoon when Ace is sticky and sweaty and generally gross from training with Gramps, Ace has a plan.

It's not the best plan, because it doesn't involve Luffy _not crying_ in the first place, but it's a good plan.

Ace bundles the two of them into his bed and rocks Luffy a bit, like he only distantly remembers Dadan and Gramps having done for him, before he even had a little brother. And then he asks Luffy to tell him a story about Shanks.

Luffy lights up like a firework, tears and fears forgotten, happy happy happy to talk about his hero.

Ace wins at _life_.

Or at least that's what he thinks until the day Luffy _doesn't_ come crying to him.

Gramps is over for a visit again, and training. And this time, he's going to train Ace and Luffy together!

Ace likes the training, even if it's scary sometimes and hard and hurts a bit. It's fun, in a way, and challenging.

But Luffy is fidgety and distracted and not paying attention – because there are birds singing and insects flying around and life _happening_ and Luffy is so easily sidetracked.

Gramps, predictably, looses patience when he turns from Ace to see Luffy crouched down and poking, fascinated, at something on the ground. "Luffy, pay attention to your grandpa when he's teaching you things!" And smacks him upside the head.

Luffy yelps and cowers a bit and Ace _knows_ that look!

It's the look that says "hide me" and "I'm scared" and it _should not be on Luffy's face_!

Gramps has no right to scare Ace's little brother.

"Don't hit Luffy again you _shitty old man_!!"

There's a moment of stillness, Luffy too shocked to keep crying; Gramps stunned into silence.

And then he throws his head back and laughs.

"Bwahahahaha! _HahahahaHA_!"

Ace gets a thump of his own for his pains – and it's definitely harder than it needed to be, but he thinks there might be some pride behind that. It makes him glow a bit, inside – once it gets past his anger and thoughts of _don't-hurt-my-brother-or-I'll-kick-your-ass_, at least.

The way Luffy looks at him after that, though, as if Ace is the strongest person in the _world_ – after Grandpa and Shanks – makes him feel like he might actually be as strong as Luffy thinks he is. Like he can actually protect Luffy from anything because he's the big brother. Like, yeah, this poorly-made bundle of hyperactivity and recklessness is _his_ dammit, and nobody gets to mess with him. Makes the lump on his head more than worth it.

Even if Luffy takes to ducking behind Ace whenever Gramps visits after that.


End file.
